My Year Without Udo Jürgens

»At 6.11 pm my mobile buzzed with a text: ›Udo Jürgens is dead.‹ The message came from Nina, the teacher from near Gießen. We had stood next to each other at the last concert and she had suddenly said out of nowhere: ›It’s this radical emotionalism.‹ She said this around an hour into the concert and, with it, uncovered the Udo Jürgens formula. Udo Jürgens as the fully lived present tense. The big yes.« (Andreas Maier)

For many years the songs of Udo Jürgens have been an essential component of Patrick Wengenroth’s theatrical work. Together with Thomas Thieme and musician Matze Kloppe, he takes them along on a journey into writer Andreas Maier’s entertaining as well as profound examination of the phenomenon that is Udo Jürgens. From »Merci Chérie« to »Es wird Nacht, Señorita« (It’s Getting Dark, Señorita), Maier fathoms the secret of Jürgens’ emotionalism and, in passing, paints the portrait of a generation. Patrick Wengenroth is a director, actor and an »advanced training course for the German theatre business« (taz). His productions for the Schaubühne include works by Nietzsche, Fassbinder and Büchner. In summer 2016 he is staging a football musical at the HAU Theater.